Read Online Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy by Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, David L. Weaver-Zercher - Free Book Online Page B
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some of our own [non-Amish] people, there would have been one lawsuit after another. . . . But this experience brought everybody closer together.” In a public statement released ten days after the shooting, the Roberts family specifically thanked the local Amish community: “Your compassion has reached beyond our family, beyond our community, and is changing our world, and for this we sincerely thank you.” A confidant of the killer’s parents said, “All of the expressions of forgiveness provided a great freedom that enabled them to move on with healing despite all the sadness and sorrow. It gave them hope for the future and released them from the heavy burden.”
A friend of the killer’s widow said, “The forgiveness and generosity of the Amish had a powerful impact on Amy. She was overwhelmed and very moved by it. Many Amish neighbors came to visit her in the weeks following the shooting. They came to the burial, they brought flowers to her home, and they brought meals.”
These simple acts of Amish grace soon eclipsed the story of schoolhouse slaughter. On Wednesday, two days after the shooting, the media calls we received suddenly turned from questions about Amish schools to questions about Amish forgiveness. How could they forgive so quickly? Did their leaders demand that they do it? Or was it all a gimmick, designed only to garner good publicity for their community?
As the media gathered answers to these questions, Amish forgiveness became the focal point in hundreds of news stories around the world. From the Washington Post to USA Today, from NBC Nightly News to Larry King Live, from the Christian Science Monitor to the Christian Broadcasting Network, from the Khaleej Times to Australian television, journalists found themselves reporting a story they had not set out to cover.
The initial news stories were soon followed by legions of commentaries and editorials reflecting on the virtues of forgiveness, dismissing it as emotionally unhealthy, or asking what might have happened if the United States had responded with forgiveness to the terrorist attacks of September 11. Ordinary people entered the conversation as well; thousands of reader letters reflected on this surprising extension of grace and wondered whether it was a model for others to emulate. (We explore some of these reactions in the next chapter.)
What these letters and media stories often lacked, however, were accounts of the concrete acts of Amish grace that we have just noted. Given the reluctance of Amish people to talk with the media, this dearth of information is hardly surprising. In this instance, however, the silence cannot be reduced to the fact that Amish people do not boast to the media about what they do. In this case, they did not talk about their forgiving acts because, to them, granting forgiveness was a natural, spontaneous, and quite ordinary thing. Refusing to forgive “is not an option,” said Bishop Eli, a welder. “It’s just a normal part of our living.”
How did the Amish decide so quickly to extend forgiveness? That question brought laughter from some Amish people we interviewed. “You mean some people actually thought we got together to plan forgiveness?” chuckled Katie, a seventy-five-year-old grandmother, as she worked in her kitchen. “Forgiveness was a decided issue,” explained Bishop Eli. “It’s just what we do as nonresistant people. It was spontaneous. It was automatic. It was not a new kind of thing.” Every Amish person we spoke with agreed: forgiveness for Roberts and grace for his family had begun as spontaneous expressions of faith, not as mandates from the church.
That the outside world was surprised at Amish forgiveness in turn surprised the Amish. “Why is everybody all surprised?” asked one Amish man. “It’s just standard Christian forgiveness; it’s what everybody should be doing.” Sadie, a bookkeeper and mother of three, was similarly taken aback by
A friend of the killer’s widow said, “The forgiveness and generosity of the Amish had a powerful impact on Amy. She was overwhelmed and very moved by it. Many Amish neighbors came to visit her in the weeks following the shooting. They came to the burial, they brought flowers to her home, and they brought meals.”
These simple acts of Amish grace soon eclipsed the story of schoolhouse slaughter. On Wednesday, two days after the shooting, the media calls we received suddenly turned from questions about Amish schools to questions about Amish forgiveness. How could they forgive so quickly? Did their leaders demand that they do it? Or was it all a gimmick, designed only to garner good publicity for their community?
As the media gathered answers to these questions, Amish forgiveness became the focal point in hundreds of news stories around the world. From the Washington Post to USA Today, from NBC Nightly News to Larry King Live, from the Christian Science Monitor to the Christian Broadcasting Network, from the Khaleej Times to Australian television, journalists found themselves reporting a story they had not set out to cover.
The initial news stories were soon followed by legions of commentaries and editorials reflecting on the virtues of forgiveness, dismissing it as emotionally unhealthy, or asking what might have happened if the United States had responded with forgiveness to the terrorist attacks of September 11. Ordinary people entered the conversation as well; thousands of reader letters reflected on this surprising extension of grace and wondered whether it was a model for others to emulate. (We explore some of these reactions in the next chapter.)
What these letters and media stories often lacked, however, were accounts of the concrete acts of Amish grace that we have just noted. Given the reluctance of Amish people to talk with the media, this dearth of information is hardly surprising. In this instance, however, the silence cannot be reduced to the fact that Amish people do not boast to the media about what they do. In this case, they did not talk about their forgiving acts because, to them, granting forgiveness was a natural, spontaneous, and quite ordinary thing. Refusing to forgive “is not an option,” said Bishop Eli, a welder. “It’s just a normal part of our living.”
How did the Amish decide so quickly to extend forgiveness? That question brought laughter from some Amish people we interviewed. “You mean some people actually thought we got together to plan forgiveness?” chuckled Katie, a seventy-five-year-old grandmother, as she worked in her kitchen. “Forgiveness was a decided issue,” explained Bishop Eli. “It’s just what we do as nonresistant people. It was spontaneous. It was automatic. It was not a new kind of thing.” Every Amish person we spoke with agreed: forgiveness for Roberts and grace for his family had begun as spontaneous expressions of faith, not as mandates from the church.
That the outside world was surprised at Amish forgiveness in turn surprised the Amish. “Why is everybody all surprised?” asked one Amish man. “It’s just standard Christian forgiveness; it’s what everybody should be doing.” Sadie, a bookkeeper and mother of three, was similarly taken aback by
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